About
35 people attended the 10th anniversary VSS AGM on Sat, 28 Mar. Among
the highlights were brief talks by two people who were particularly active
during VSSs earlier years and are still promoting vegetarianism now: Allein Moore and Violet Lee. Loh Yeow Nguan was presented with a
box of mangoes for his outstanding contributions to VSSs work over the years,
and everyone enjoyed the great food and beautiful birthday cake supplied by
Kalavira - www.kalavira.com and the lovely brownies
offered by Wholesome
Living - http://wholesomeliving-sg.com/schedules.html as
well.

An advance copy of the
vegetarian food guide that VSS is preparing in collaboration with STB was passed
around, and an update was given on our work with
schools.

Here is the opening
address delivered at the AGM:

Invest...

While we know that an animal-based diet is unsustainable for
the planet, cruel to our fellow animals and hazardous to our own health,
effecting a mindset change among the public is complex. This is why VSS
currently invests more effort in schools. We are raising awareness of dietary
habits in the young and trying to improve food served in schools. We also bring
international experts to Singapore to improve health
guidelines.

One step at a time... one important and effective step at a time, knowing
that a plant based diet has multiple and multiplying benefits. While we do our
best in our Education effort, we also try build a sense of fun, vibrancy and
support for the vegetarian circle. Thus, we do social and recreational
events.

When financial times are bad, all the more important it is for us to
invest in the good, in the virtuous. Please join us! Everyones contributions
counts: contributions of time, skills, ideas and/or funds. The task is urgent;
the task is ours.

All
hands on deck!

VSS
At Earth Hour

The Earth Hour event on the evening of 28 Mar focused the worlds
attention on addressing the dangers of climate change. VSS members went down to
Esplanade
Park to bring the message
that meat production is a key source of GHGs (greenhouse gases).

We
used a couple of different methods of spreading the veg message, including
wearing the VSS t-shirt. When the DJs hosting the event asked the audience for
tips of reducing GHGs, we tried without success to get called on. Fortunately,
one of the DJs, Nadya
Hutalagung
- http://www.nadyahutagalung.com/main.html
- was asked for her energy saving tip, to which she replied, Go
Vegetarian!

Here is one version of a letter we sent unsuccessfully to the Forum page
of two newspapers in an effort to share the same
message:

I refer to A dark,
green snowball effect in Today
of 19 March, 2009. Earth Hour, when homes, offices and others switch off
their lights, is a great way to involve people in tackling the potentially
catastrophic effects of Global Warming.

Another way to reduce
our production of GHGs (greenhouse gases) is to reduce our meat consumption. The
UNs Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) report, Livestocks Long Shadow
estimates that livestock production accounts for 18% of GHG emissions, whereas
transport accounts for 13%.

Dr Rajendra
Pachauri, chair of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change,
2007 co-winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, has called our attention to the role of
meat in climate change and has urged us to go
meat-free at least once a week.

At every meal
we eat, we can take action against Global Warming by reducing our meat
consumption.

Education
For Sustainable Development

On 8 Apr, VSS will be
participating in a landmark meeting to discuss the possibility of setting up in
Singapore, a Regional Centre of Expertise on Education
for Sustainable Development. We were invited to the forum by the
Environmental Challenge Organisation (Singapore) and were asked to invite those
interested to be a part of this initiative to contact Mr Ashley Tan, an
executive with the Environmental Challenge Organisation (Singapore) at 8198.8397
or 6333.5543.

The
8 Weeks to Wellness (8WW) programme is a package that includes pre and
post-health screening, health lectures on the preventive and therapeutic aspects
of the vegetarian diet by doctors, a dietician and certified health educators,
cooking demos, vegetarian meals, workbooks and other materials. The maximum
number of participants is 40. Reservation is by pre-payment
only.

This website - http://www.veganjobs.org-
has a very small listing of vegan jobs. Maybe someday there can be a listing of
vegetarian jobs in
Singapore . In the meantime, if you
have a vegetarian job to offer, please send the necessary information to
us.

Also, if you would like to do some (unpaid) work with VSS, please do
contact us - info@...-
and let us know your interests and talents. We do receive emails from people
offering to volunteer and probably the best thing to do is to check out what VSS
does  read this eNewsletter, attend some events and visit our website  www.vss.sg
in order to know how you might contribute
comfortably.

Classic
Video  The Meatrix

Weve mentioned
this short video before, but a reader suggested that we plug it again,
especially for those who enjoyed the movie The Matrix, but might not have
seen this spoof: http://www.themeatrix.com

Jeffrey
Moussaieff Masson wants to help all meat eaters wake up from the dream of denial
they are experiencing. He wants to prepare us for what he describes as a
"transformative moment," when we look at the meat or animal product on our plate
(fish, fowl, mammal, egg, milk, cheese) and acknowledge that it came from a
living being, capable, he has no doubt, of suffering and happiness. Like
children when they are first told that the drumstick is actually a leg, the
tongue is really a tongue, the bacon was once a pig like Wilbur in "Charlotte's
Web," Masson hopes, with all his heart, that we will say, "Eeeuwww,
yuck."

2.
Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating
With More Than 75 Recipes by Mark Bittman

Mark made the
changes after developing high cholesterol, borderline high blood sugar, bad
knees and sleep apnea, and realizing he was about 35 pounds overweight. A doctor
suggested he adopt a vegan diet, which means no animal products. But for a food
writer, Mark said, becoming a full-time vegan was both unrealistic and
undesirable. Instead, he came up with a compromise: I decided to do this sort of
vegan till 6 plan. I didnt have huge thoughts or plans about it. I just
thought it was worth a try. Within three or four months, I lost 35 pounds, my
blood sugar was normal, cholesterol levels were again normal and my sleep
apnea indeed went away. All these good things happened, and it wasnt as if I
was suffering so I stayed with it . I have not eliminated anything completely
from my diet. I havent had a Coke in a while, but I didnt drink that much Coke
to begin with.

There
was a time in high school when Bryant Terry "went off the deep end with junk
food." The author of Vegan Soul
Kitchen indulged an adolescent appetite for McDonalds, Burger King, and
the offerings of other dreck purveyors in his hometown of Memphis. The memory of
the satisfaction that came from cheap, fatty food informs Terry's work as a food
writer and activist in Oakland some 20 years later. He's not judgmental when he
sees a kid tucking into a bag of Cheetos. He just wants the kid to know there's
a better world of food out there. In 2006, he co-authored Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic
Kitchen with Anna Lappe, the daughter of Frances Moore Lappe, who
published Diet
for a Small Planetin
1971.

I
Cant Believe Im Still A Vegan

Its
always interesting to read peoples How I Became a Vegetarian stories. Heres
one from a journalist who went vegan in his mid-50s, mostly, it seems to lose
weight and to maintain a healthy weight: http://www.newsweek.com/id/189291

Heres the first paragraph of the article:

More than halfway through my sixth decade, I have learned to live with
the routine insults and occasional horrors of passing timethe daily aches and
pains, the eroding senses (say again?), the too-frequent diagnosis of cancer and
other life-threatening illnesses among my peers. I accept these blows, big and
small, as the price to be paid for the joys I've known and whatever wisdom I've
been able to acquire over the years. I accept them because, well, I really don't
have a choice. There is one thing, however I will not abide: getting
fat.

Please send VSS your own How I Became a Vegetarian stories to info@...

The Health Promotion Boards website has several articles extolling the
virtues of eating lots of fruit and veg, and also on vegetarian diets. They have
good advice on how to be a healthy vegetarian, such as being sure to get B12 and
avoiding too much deep fried food: http://www.hpb.gov.sg/foodforhealth/subtopic.aspx?id=62

New
Eatery In Pasir Ris: Yummy Green

Healthy veg cuisine is now available at E!HUB NTUC Downtown
East. Families that bring children for a day of fun and amusement no longer
need to worry about where to find good vegetarian food. This stall specialises
in Japanese and Western style vegetarian. Opening promotion of 10% discount till
end-Apr 2009